An overcast and very windy and cold day. We had a northerly gale all morning, with frequent showers. The mercury did not make it above 5C / 41F all day.
The Attorney General for Northern Ireland has suggested an amnesty for all the crimes committed as part of the sectarian fighting in the province before Good Friday 1998. The suggestion has met with a frosty reception, both in Ulster and in London. Some 3,500 people were killed by the various factions in the province between 1969 and 1998. The hurt of that continues to date, and will continue for a long time to come. Northern Ireland has been basically at peace since 2001, but the memories will remain. If anything, the atrocity of 9/11 had one good outcome; it showed the American backers of the IRA what terrorism actually means, and what they were sponsoring. I agree that those who have committed atrocities in Ulster should be held to account, irrespective of the passage of time. The fact that Germany established itself as a respectable nation in the aftermath of World War II does not mean that the war criminals of the Nazi era should not be brought to justice.
I opted to boycott a well known fast food chain which resides under the golden arches a good many years ago, after it came to light to quite what extent they had bolstered the coffers of the IRA. Growing up in London in the 1980's one was never entirely certain if a journey might be disrupted or indeed whether a simple trip into town was likely to turn nasty. The story yesterday made me very cross indeed, and the story today breaking about "innocent" civilians being shot all the more so, due to the reaction of those formerly involved in IRA activity to it. They are on their high horses, but apparently the many people who's lives were ended or changed beyond belief in London and, later, Manchester matter not a bit.
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